“It’s a horrible feeling but it’s a reality of football, it’s a points-based game and unfortunately these things happen.”

Wilson has endured difficult times in football including the time former club Portsmouth went into administration.

“Unfortunately not,” when asked if this was a personal low point.

“When I was at Portsmouth the club went into administration. That was pretty low.

“The confidence in the boys has been low, it has to be better.

“As a club I think we’ve got to improve because it’s a massive club and the results just aren’t good enough.

“It’s up to us to take responsibility and push on.

“I thought against Middlesbrough we could have scored a few more goals but that’s football. I’m not going to stand here and say we were unlucky because you make your own luck in football.

“There’s enough quality in the squad, it’s just trying to dig that out. If we can nail down what we’re going to do in games quite early in the week then no question about it, I don’t think we’ll have a problem getting out of it.”

Managerless Sunderland are without a game this weekend due to the international break.

When asked what is needed from the next manager, Wilson added: “That’s not for me to say.

“We’ll have to wait and see what the powers above say but as players we can only act on the pitch and we’ve definitely got to improve, no question about that.”